The coordinating council of the Cooperative Baptist Fel­lowship-Heartland approved changes to its governing documents to make them consistent with the Liberty-based Fellow­ship’s new name.

The organization changed its name effective Jan. 1 from CBF-Missouri to CBF-Heart­land to better reflect its desire to reach out to CBF congregations in Kansas, Iowa and Illinois.

As such, Coordinator Harold Phillips explained, the entity will be recognized as a CBF regional entity rather than a state entity.

Bylaw changes approved for the organization and its endowment board by the coordinating council, meeting by conference call on Jan. 26, will “go to the general assembly and the whole assembly will vote in April, and that’s when it becomes complete,” he said.

The annual general assembly meeting will be April 26-27 at Memorial Baptist Church in Columbia.

Staff also advised council members that first-year coordinator Kathy Pickett had agreed to serve a second one-year in that role; that moderator-elect Michael Olmsted, currently filling a recently vacated position, moderator-elect, had agreed to assume the same role next year; and that Nancy Thompson of Des Moines, Iowa, had agreed to be nominated as vice-moderator for a year in April.

This will enable Pickett to be moderator until the 2014 election, Olmsted the next year and Thompson, with two years of training under her belt, starting in 2015, broadening leadership beyond Missouri.

Associate coordinator Jeff Langford introduced a plan for “engagement teams” to help involve CBF-Heartland participants into areas such as administration, missions, leadership, vitality and community. He circulated a list containing these headings with specific tasks under each and encouraged coordinating council members to commit to those of special interest to them.

“This...list is one way perhaps that we can engage many more people in the life and work of the Fellowship,” he said.

He also gave an update on efforts to either adopt a virtual office approach or a modified approach in conjunction with office space in a church. In order to assist CBF-Heartland with its overhead, the current landlord had agreed to lower monthly lease payments from $900 to $500 through the current lease, Langford said, with the understanding that if a another tenant is found willing to pay the higher rent, the three-person CBF staff would leave.